


True Love Looked Me In The Eye

by amooniesong



Series: Eurovision but it's Minecraft Youtubers [1]
Category: Eurovision Song Contest RPF, Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Eurovision Song Contest, Light Angst, M/M, Musicians, Post-Break Up, Reminiscing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-16
Updated: 2020-09-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 19:02:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26493826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amooniesong/pseuds/amooniesong
Summary: “You’ll like this next one.” Wilbur said, teasing the tuning keys between his forefinger and thumb as he spoke. “It’s about my ex.” Looking from the head of the guitar and into the dark audience he heard a few laughs, so he smiled a little wider and pushed the joke a little further. “He wrote it, I got it in the settlement.”---------------------Wilbur and George broke up a few months ago and Wilbur is spending his evenings playing sets in a local pub. Tonight he plays a new song, and he gets a very important email.
Relationships: GeorgeNotFound/Wilbur Soot
Series: Eurovision but it's Minecraft Youtubers [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1926178
Comments: 33
Kudos: 172





	True Love Looked Me In The Eye

The lights of the pub were turned down low, the small standing rig beside his stool swaying just a little as he shifted himself while the gentle applause died down. He moved quietly in the moment, hardwood floors creaking beneath him while he leaned forwards to take a small sip of water from his bottle, sliding the intensity of the LED lights beside him down just a little. From this close he was starting to feel heat that, with time, had caused his palms to sweat ever so slightly.

“You’ll like this next one.” Wilbur said, teasing the tuning keys between his forefinger and thumb as he spoke. “It’s about my ex.” Looking from the head of the guitar and into the dark audience he heard a few laughs, so he smiled a little wider and pushed the joke a little further. “He wrote it, I got it in the settlement.” The laughter was a little louder that time - a booming clap from somewhere in the darkness from someone that was clearly still bitter towards an ex-partner of their own. But Wilbur wasn’t bitter, not really, he couldn’t _be_ bitter when it had been mutual. Supposedly, anyway.

He shifted his posture and moved so that his fingers rested comfortably over the correct frets. Pushing down on the strings he played the opening chords: an _A Minor_ , followed by a _G_ , then finally an _F_. The crowd had settled back into quiet observation and he cleared his throat, repeating the introduction once more and closing his eyes as he took in a deep breath and began to sing softly into the microphone standing just beside his head.

_“We were drifting like two icebergs out on the ocean, I was doing all I could to keep you close. There were troubles in the water, you swore it was nothing, you said that we would always stay afloat.”_

As the chords changed he shifted his position again, leaning his head to the left slightly to let his hair fall away from his eyes. 

_“Why would true love look me in the eye and lie, lie?”_

The chords changed again and Wilbur moved with them, taking in a breath before the chorus. He could feel how shaky it was, how much resistance it met as his throat seemed to close in on itself and his lungs rejected the air. He supposed after the years they’d shared together this was always going to be a particularly hard time - the run up to Christmas and New Year had been something he _loved_ celebrating with George and now the darkness that swallowed up the little town seemed so much darker, the cold stinging a little more than usual. The few months since they’d broken up hadn’t been easy but he thought he’d processed it all. Clearly, he hadn’t. 

_“I thought we’d be together ‘til we die, I will forever wonder why. I thought we’d be together ‘til we die… I’ll forever wonder why.”_

Wilbur swallowed, flicking his hair a little more enthusiastically as he pushed through the pain of tears that threatened to spill and the sobs wanted to force their way from his chest. It was mutual, that was what he told himself, and it _was_ mutual but that didn’t stop the hurt that came with being alone after so long with George.

_“Why have you been coming home so late in the evening? Is there someone else that I should know about? ‘Cause there’s a smile on your face that I haven’t seen since we started going out.”_

His tongue poked between his lips and wet them just a little, teeth grazing against the chapped skin as he forced himself to smile. It was for the audience, _of course,_ because the idea that the smile on his face could’ve been caused by George even after everything they’d been through was ludicrous. 

Well, not _that_ ludicrous.

As the chorus came to a head once more he let glassy eyes move away from the guitar and focus instead on the people that sat before him. They were silent - either entranced by the performance or waiting with baited breath to see if he’d break. He wouldn’t give them that satisfaction: though George hadn’t been satisfied when he’d broken. He hadn’t been jumping for joy when tears fell from his eyes and he choked on his words - eventually managing to spit broken sentences and stammered insults out. He didn’t mean it, didn’t mean any of it.

And at the end of the day, it had all been _his_ fault. 

_“We said ‘until death do us part’, and then you chose to break my heart. Remember right back to the start? When we said we’d be together ‘til we die.”_

His fingers were starting to get sore - he’d start using a pick with his next song but for now it was a distraction he was grateful for. He could focus on the pain of skin against nylon rather than the memories of how upset George had been when he’d finally confronted him with his fears - only for everything to shatter and blow back up in his face. 

George had been planning to propose, and there Wilbur was not able to trust him for spending a few nights away later than usual. 

The plans that George had made were swiftly shelved as they’d argued about trust, and then as they ran out of insults and accusations they moved onto the little things - the way George didn’t make the bed when he woke up and the way that Wilbur left his dirty plates by the sink rather than washing them. Or how George had spent hours of his life, cumulatively, picking up beanies and socks that had been left scattered around their home, and how Wilbur had to physically stop George from bingeing on fast food every night of the week.

All the little things, the parts of their relationship that could be overlooked because of how much _good_ came with it all, they became weapons used against each other. Instead of being tiny stones on the ground everything became like Legos underfoot. It was painful, and no matter what they tried to do to escape it they couldn’t. It went on for weeks as they tried, in vain, to continue their relationship but they could only keep up the facade for so long. Eventually, when the arguments became too much and the sofa too worn from Wilbur’s presence in the nights, they did the only logical thing.

They broke up.

_“I thought we’d be together ‘til we die, I will forever wonder why. I thought we’d be together ‘til we die… I’ll forever wonder why.”_

As the song came to an end Wilbur closed his eyes once more, feeling the tears from earlier pushing past his eyelids and spilling over his cheeks. Yeah, maybe it _had_ been too soon to share this painful part of his life with a group of complete strangers.

He placed his guitar next to him and took the microphone from the stand with one hand, the other moving to his face and covertly wiping away the tears that had been shed before fussing over his beanie to try and keep some of his dignity. “You’re not allowed to tell anyone I sang that, by the way.” He said cheerfully, trying to boost his own mood as well as that of the pub’s patrons that surrounded him. “I entered it into Eurovision and haven’t heard back - fingers crossed though.” He laughed, moving the microphone away from his face to sniffle back his emotions as he crossed his fingers and heard the gentle murmur of a laugh. Not a guffaw that had suggested he’d said something _funny_ and _meaningful_ , but a placeholder to fill the quiet that suggested mediocrity. Perhaps, if he was lucky, just a tad above mediocrity. 

It kept him from breaking, it was enough for him to pick up his guitar and continue with his set once more, so mediocrity would do.

The evening went on quickly, with patrons slowly beginning to filter out as it got later and before long Wilbur was unclipping the lights from his rig, carefully placing everything back into its proper cases to ensure that nothing would be damaged during his short walk home. Clicking latches into place and locking the various boxes he was approached by the manager of the pub, handed a small collection of notes, and engaged in a short discussion about when he’d next be able to play. Wilbur didn’t particularly care, he’d felt his phone vibrate in his pocket and would have been happy to just check the notification and head home - having this conversation at another time - but it was over soon enough. He’d be back to play again on Friday armed with an array of Christmas music, a Santa hat and a Christmas jumper: even if he didn’t _feel_ particularly festive he could at least look the part.

He was left alone, footsteps moving away from him as the manager returned to his office, and the only sound now filling the empty room was the ever so slight squeaking of the bar being wiped down by an exhausted University student just looking to make ends meet. Wilbur picked up his guitar case and slung it over his shoulder, taking his phone from his pocket and clicking to light up the screen. He read the message, then he read it again, and then he swiped up and keyed in his pass-code quickly to read it in full.

It was an unexpected message to receive - it’d come through hours ago but he’d had his phone turned off while he’d been playing and so the notification had only come now it was turned back on. It _did_ mean something a little less pleasant, though.

He navigated quickly through the screen to his texts and moved to start a new conversation, swallowing as his finger hovered over the contact labelled **_do not text_**. It wasn’t like he really had a choice now, he needed to talk to him about this. Pushing aside the feelings stirring up in his stomach (and mentally deciding to get a bottle of _anything_ from the little shop on the corner) he typed out his message and sent it without a second thought.

[SMS from “Me” to “Do Not Text” sent at 23:47] Hey, we need to talk about something. It’s work, don’t worry. Can we grab a coffee?

**Author's Note:**

> me: tell me what to write after the manhunt au  
> everyone: *doesn't vote for eurovision au*  
> me: that poll can't stop me because i can't read
> 
> jkjk i WILL be writing whatever people want next but i've fallen so in love with this au & done so much planning that i'm probably just gonna work on two fics at the same time when manhunt is done. so, for now, enjoy the first one-shot introducing what will be wilbur and george's entry into the eurovision song contest. the song in question is ["together"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAEjQXzW4Uc) by ryan o'shaughnessy & was performed at the 2018 eurovision song contest - all the songs used in the au have been entered into eurovision at some point so i'll be sure to drop links for you to all enjoy them!


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